To celebrate Mtn Dew’s arrival in Chicago for Dew NBA 3X, an elite 3×3 basketball tournament taking palce in six cities across the USA, Green Label is spotlighting the art, creativity, and culture of CHI.

All stops on the Dew NBA 3X Tour will be accompanied by #CourtsideCollection: a prolific local artist has been hand-selected to curate a custom gallery of up to 150 pieces of artwork submitted on Instagram by artists and fans paying homage to their city.

To have your work considered, enter using the hashtags #CourtsideCollection #Promotion. 18+, Ends 10/23/16, Rules: {bit.ly}

Chicago street artist Kane-1 describes his work as an “intersection of graffiti, studio painting, art education, community organizing and public space,” using both building facades and art gallery walls as his canvases of choice. He pays tribute to time-honored methods of graffiti writing, as his work is reminiscent of ‘80s hip-hop aesthetic, where contemporary adaptations of the artistic style originated.

Born Miguel Aguillar, Kane-1 is an executive director at Chicago’s prestigious Remix Project, a professional development and skills training program for young people pursuing careers in the recording and creative arts. “The Remix Project addresses the lack of opportunity for 18-25 year-olds in the city,” he told us. In fact, he has a background in community arts programs, offering spray paint lessons to Chicago youth through his Graffiti Institute.

In collaboration with Green Label, Kane-1 will transform a basketball court in Chicago’s Garfield Park into an art piece for students and passing travelers on the city’s train system, which runs above the court. His design will blast the tried-and-true message “Dream Big” to mirror Chicago’s hustle mentality. “People grow up with this grind mentality in Chicago that keeps us humble,” he said. “You can’t really get too proud of yourself, and it keeps your head down. But then when you do pick your head up once in a while, you realize how much you’ve done.”

“I wanted to play with the train tracks passing by, since that’ll be the optimal vantage point for this mural. And since this is an elementary school, I thought about messages I could convey to kids on the West side of Chicago, who take the train or who literally come to school here. It came back to that same idea: the city can make you or break you. I wanted to give those words of encouragement: to follow your dreams and not settle for less.”